Connecticut River only 'Blueway' to survive program deactivation

Published January 03. 2014 2:00PM | Updated January 03. 2014 2:27PM

BILL DRAPER, Associated Press

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A U.S. Interior Department program intended to recognize conservation efforts along the nation's waterways was dissolved on Friday amid opposition from landowners and politicians who feared it would lead to increased regulations and possible land seizures.

The National Blueways System was created in May 2012 under President Barack Obama's America's Great Outdoors Initiative. The program was voluntary, didn't include any new regulations, and a designation — bestowed on only two rivers, one of which was dropped last year because of local opposition — brought no additional funding.

Interior Secretary Sally Jewell said in a statement that her agency decided to disband the program, which was formed by her predecessor, Ken Salazar, after a departmental review.

"The National Blueways Committee will be deactivated, but the department will continue to encourage collaborative, community-based watershed partnerships that support sustainable and healthy water supplies," department spokeswoman Jessica Kershaw said.

Jewell put the program on hold in July, two weeks after removing the designation from the White River, which spans more than 700 miles through Missouri and Arkansas. The only other National Blueway waterway — the Connecticut River, which runs through Connecticut, Massachusetts, Vermont and New Hampshire — will retain the designation, Jewell said Friday.

While the program was intended solely to recognize conservation efforts, supporters hoped that gaining a National Blueway designation would put their waterways at the front of the line for federal grants. The White River received the designation after several groups, including the Missouri Department of Conservation and the Nature Conservancy, nominated it for inclusion.

Federal officials insisted the program would not include any new protective status or regulations, but opponents in Missouri and Arkansas — largely conservative groups — weren't convinced. Their pushback intensified in late June, when a coalition of Republican U.S. senators and representatives from both states sent a letter to the Interior Department asking how to revoke the designation.

Eventually, even supporters of the White River's designation pushed to have the title rescinded because they feared the dispute could make landowners resistant to voluntarily cooperating with conservation efforts.

"We all agree that we should work to protect our waterways, but a new federal Blueway program is not necessary to improve the cooperation of federal and state agencies on the management of the White River," Arkansas Sen. John Boozman said after the designation was rescinded in July. "This designation occurred without a formal process — no public comment, lack of transparency from the federal government and without the broad support of Arkansans."

The Interior Department said only one other state had expressed interest in the program, but that it never got past the discussion stage before Jewell put it on hold.

Jeannie Burlsworth, founder of the conservative group Secure Arkansas, applauded the decision to end the program.

"If there hadn't been such a public outcry, they would have never rescinded it," she said. "They had planned on doing this across the U.S."